Central Bank Communication with Public: Bank of England and Twitter (X)

Fatih Kansoy; Joel Mundy

Working Paper · Jul 2025

Bank of England and Twitter (X)

with Joel Mundy (Bank of England) · University of Oxford Department of Economics Discussion Papers

PDF SSRN arXiv

Summary

What drives public engagement with central-bank social-media posts: timing, format, readability, or volume? Using 9,810 official Bank of England tweets and a 3.13 million tweet background corpus, this paper shows that richer media and better timing matter far more than simply posting more often.

Photo and video tweets attract much higher engagement, MPC days and readable text help, and the Bank often posts less when attention is naturally highest. The result is a practical communication lesson for central banks: content design and timing dominate volume as tools for public reach.

Figure showing Bank of England tweet activity over time, split between original tweets and replies. — Headline figure: the official account changed composition over time, with replies becoming more prominent, but volume alone does not explain engagement.

At a Glance

Research question: Which observable features of a central bank's own posts predict stronger public engagement online?
Core finding: Media-rich, readable content released in high-attention windows outperforms simple increases in posting frequency.
Data: 9,810 official tweets and a 3.13 million tweet background corpus covering 2007-2022.
Theme: Digital communication strategy for public-facing central bank transparency.

Citation

Kansoy, Fatih, and Joel Mundy. 2025. “Central Bank Communication with Public: Bank of England and Twitter (X).” University of Oxford Department of Economics Discussion Papers.

@article{kansoy2025central,
  title   = {Central Bank Communication with Public: Bank of England and Twitter (X)},
  author  = {Kansoy, Fatih and Mundy, Joel},
  journal = {University of Oxford Department of Economics Discussion Papers},
  year    = {2025}
}